As millennials we can construct an entire conversation based on the language of emoji. Their use has grown rapidly since their introduction in 1998, with the power to add value or devalue content. Although employees of all ages are quickly adapting to life in the digital sphere, some desire those professional barriers to remain intact. Before you send that email to your boss’s boss, first consider whether an emoji is an appropriate form of expression.

It is now two decades since Bill Gates told us that ‘content is king’ and although many businesses have tried to prove that times have changed and the maxim is no longer relevant, it remains a cornerstone of any digital marketing campaign. As marketers become increasingly focused on the power of social networks and the importance of big data, we take a look at why quality content remains essential to success.

Talk about the role of data in this area has mostly been limited to disciplines like keyword research and influencer identification. When we say data, we mean the numbers behind your social media campaigns, for example how many people your post has reached on Facebook and how many times people have interacted with your tweet. Here we have pulled together our top 5 ways to put data at the centre of your marketing strategy, with tips on how to maximise the opportunities it presents.

What data should we be studying?

Your Web Content: At the centre of most content marketing strategies is a content calendar, this document should be driving the data which you choose to study. Everything in said content calendar, including the types of content, blog titles, publication times and content categorisation, should be subject to data interrogation. Already have a content calendar? Brilliant, already having a content calendar puts you one step ahead as you can analyse what data tells you about what you’re already doing. For those of you who are part of a large business, you may have a team of data analysts and developers in-house; request they extract your blog’s content data in a structured way, showing key information and your established KPIs so you can evaluate what is, and isn’t working.

Your competitors content: Similarly, analysing your competitors in the same way can provide some really valuable insights. This will take more manual effort as you won’t be able to export their proprietary data although from the information you gather, you will be able to identify opportunities to determine new topic areas, be inspired with new content ideas, plus be able see how your performance compares. All in all, it will definitely be worth the time and effort.

Guest posts and external content: Just like studying your competitors, tracking the content which you have published on platforms other than your own is also valuable but extremely manual and time consuming. Tracking the post engagements/interactions, publishing time/date and number of site visits will help you see what is working well and what isn’t working so well. If you’re also focusing on the SEO benefit of your content, it may be worth tracking additional metrics as well, such as page rank, domain authority and trust flow.

Social Media Content: From what content to create to the weighting of that content within your overall plan, social data can help to make a wide range of decisions and should be considered as a considerably powerful tool for driving your content marketing strategy. All social media platforms have tools which help you gain an insight into your performance; for example you can pull key metrics from Facebook insights on performance, such as how many people your post reached, how many people engaged with your post and which post/posts are performing the best, all of these things put together will help you understand what your audience is interested in and help you understand how your content is being received.

Social data can also reveal important insights into your audience – by using audience profiling tools such as Optimal Social, you can gain knowledge of other types of content your readers are engaging with. This can help to inspire you to create new content topics and ideas with a high possibility to interest your audience.

What do I do with the data?

Now that you have gathered all of the data, you need to compile a report which you can refer back to, that will also provide you with a snapshot of information to help develop and inform your content marketing strategy. No two reports are the same, as the report needs to look at the KPI’s which are specific to your business

Once you’ve put together your report, you need to identify what issues you can see and begin to resolve said issue. Also, the report will help you see what big opportunities you could be missing out on which your competitors are benefiting from. Use it to refine key components of your strategy that could use a boost in performance, and to see if your results show you that you’re moving in the wrong direction.

By being aware of and scrutinising every element of your content strategy (using data and adopting a data-led approach) you are likely to make positive and significant changes for the better in your marketing efforts. Make sure you analyse your performance over time and check the numbers and metrics are going in the right direction. An approach driven by data is set to develop and improve your strategy, whatever your brand or company.

There are over a Billion people now on FB and you can reach just about anyone you can think of whether there on their phone, tablet or desktop. Many advertisers think that Google is the main way to reach consumers but with its lower costs, higher penetration and engaging content creation FB is proving to be a more effective advertising channel. Facebook has just expanded it’s fantastic targeting and Data integration options to now include new UK audiences. Read this Infographic for some tips and advice on how to super charge your FB campaigns and reach new UK consumers.

A breath of fresh air, Mari Smith took command of the stage for the fourth talk of the day at The Big UK Social Media Conference #BigSocial, Facebook Marketing Expert delved straight in, highly recommending brands to plan a year in advance and break their social marketing strategy down into quarters; a four-phase profit system.

This helps to add value, build community and test, track and measure your performance. Mari went through this system in sections:

Core Phase: The fundamentals, every day postings

Build-up Phase: Creating anticipation and empowering affiliates

Promotion Phase: A good time to promote FREE webinars and content

Follow-up Phase: Send messages like ‘There’s still time to join!’ to keep potential customer in the loop

“Facebook ads don’t work” is something Mari hears a lot, and has plenty to say to counteract that argument; although it only works if you do it right. Fails can include an unclear message and confusing landing page, or an error on the user’s’ behalf.

So how can you make Facebook marketing WORK? Mari covered some great tips, the first being that it is crucial to be clear of what you are selling, plus some example objectives, including:

Launching a new product

Driving in-store sales

Driving traffic to your website

Increasing online sales

Building email lists

Raising brand awareness

Improving customer service

It takes so many touch points now to gain conversion and customers – and it is key to remember that when people are on Facebook, they are in social mode, not search mode. Adapt your approach and language accordingly to not interfere with user’s intentions! A further key point Mari mentioned on this topic was to target your own email database on Facebook to increase your touchpoints and therefore, conversion.

When putting an advert together, remember where you are driving the person to. An example brought to our attention was the Daily Burn, which Mari is a big fan of because it hit the right target audience, had a compelling CTA, a relevant image, it was timely and had an irresistible offer; these are key to a successful Facebook advert.

Other useful tips Mari brought to our attention include:

Be 100% socially devoted

Offer excellent customer service via social media

Be warm, personal and human

Use first names

Surprise and delight

Think outside the box

Essentially, you could have the best product in the world – but if no one knows about it, you aren’t going to sell. Sounds simple but Mari hit the nail on the head. By tying in all of these tips and by truly caring about the audience, you are sure to thrive – a nice ending to an entertaining and enthusiastic talk.

[include_form title=”Need help with your social media marketing?” subtitle=”We’re always happy to talk, get in touch so we can have a chat!”]

Following a huge applause from the audience, Lilach Bullock was the second speaker of the day at The Big UK Social Media Conference #BigSocial ready to discuss powerful Twitter strategies.

Kicking things off with the statement that it’s not about the quantity of followers; rather, the quality of them – Lilach was keen to stress that being on Twitter (well, any social media platform for that matter) is all about having a loyal and engaged following.

Go back to basics, she advised, and consider WHO and WHERE your audience are, and WHAT they want to see and hear. On that note, it’s important to get your brand’s Twitter handle out there on everything from business cards to merchandise, products to transport – this is key to visibility.

A useful tip Lilach mentioned to help build your following was the power of Twitter lists, a great way for people to find and engage with your brand. This is a feature that can often get overlooked, but it is worth devoting time to this when using the platform. We’ll be sure to take that on board!

Echoing Sharon’s emphasis on defining the purpose of content and social posts and putting quality ahead of quantity, it’s not about how OFTEN you tweet, but more so WHAT you are tweeting. Provide great value, and people will love it – simple and straight to the point. With an optimised profile plus asking questions on the channel to encourage interaction, these should be key elements in any Twitter strategy.

Split testing your tweets was an important point mentioned by Lilach. Anything can be split tested, from headlines and hashtags to time of the day and whether links, images and/or questions work best. The audience nodded in agreement, keen to apply this practice to Twitter and social posting, not just things like email subject lines.

Tip: Think about the type of prize you are giving away in order to get people to engage – that’s what’s important!

Onto Twitter advertising, something which Lilach sees as a great, cost effective form of social advertising. Interestingly, she mentioned that the best results have been seen with the promoted accounts in search option, which helps to increase reach and is shown to users with high intent; ready to take action.

Tell users why they should follow you in your adverts, keep it simple and don’t offer distractions – great points raised there. Lilach also stressed not to put more than one call to action within your Twitter advert, as you want your audience to quickly take action and not have to read loads of text.

Finally, onto some Twitter tools. Here are the ones mentioned:

Buffer – for scheduling social updates

SocialOomph – the only tool to allow recurring scheduled tweets

ManageFlitter – for cleaning up your Twitter account

Talkwalker – a social listening tool for analytics

TweetChat – for monitoring topics and chats

Hashtagify – search for hashtags and find influencers

Commun.It – relationships of Twitter followers

To round things off and to highlight the last part of the fast and furious talk, a strong message from Lilach: if you are not monitoring and analysing your Twitter activity then you shouldn’t be doing it at all. We completely agree with that point!

[include_form title=”Need help with your social marketing?” subtitle=”We’re always happy to talk, get in touch so we can have a chat!”]

First up on the day of The Big UK Social Media Conference #BigSocial was ‘content, PR and social lover’, Sharon Flaherty, also known as the MD of BrandContent, a boutique content marketing consultancy.

Since people spend about 30% of their time on social channels, it’s important for businesses and brands that the content produced is GOOD – high quality, engaging, interesting and relevant. With so much being shared constantly, Sharon stressed that we shouldn’t be adding to it by cluttering the space with rubbish.

Defining a purpose of your brand on social is absolutely key, according to Sharon, which was a running theme throughout the day. Ask: what are you GIVING to your audience and what they should expect from you online. Some of the key elements mentioned:

Inspire

Entertain

Reassure

Educate

Inform

Support

Motivate

From this list, make sure your brand’s content – PURPOSE – ticks at least one of these. A good point Sharon mentioned was to recognise that every brand is different and to not automatically do what your competitors are doing; as quoted from Pharrell, you should pride yourself on your individuality, as that’s what makes you who you are. A little cheesy but we agree!

Authenticity was another key word brought up numerous times throughout the conference. This is the core of what makes you ‘you’, helping to bring your brand’s voice and story to life, as well as giving your audience something REAL and unique – that is where you get your real connections.

Brand ambassadors can help to realise this, using real people to endorse the brand and help to resonate more with your target audience; they can relate to them. This approach can also provide variety, using different people and stories to appeal to different audiences and cast a wider net when promoting your brand in the relevant space.

So, the key takeaways as highlighted by Sharon when it comes to defining purpose and authenticity:

What makes you different? Essentially the nuts and bolts of the brand

Defining the purpose of your content, a key part of any social strategy

The impact of your content on your audience

A final word: Define your content – what you are telling the world – and let that be your purpose. Excellent end to a thought-provoking talk.

[include_form title=”Need help with your content and social marketing?” subtitle=”We’re always happy to talk, get in touch so we can have a chat!”]

Email marketing has been ranked as number one, almost twice as high as the likes of direct mail, social media, PR and trade shows in terms of creating a return on investment for companies. It still remains the cheapest and most robust in terms of ROI and is one of the most effective channels for communication, generating leads and improving brand impressions.

Here are our top tips for you to consider when approaching email marketing which we hope you’ll find useful!

1. Choose the right email service provider

It’s important to consider the best email service provider for your campaign. There are plenty email marketing software packages, such as DotMailer, which allow you to display emails presented as web pages, make it easier to deal with unsubscribes and obtain useful stats to help measure success of the campaign. Always remember to conceal fellow subscribers’ email addresses!

2. Manage your database and define your email lists

Segmentation is the way forward for email marketing. Divide your client database into selections that fit the needs of your different target audiences so you can send relevant emails to each one. Hitting the right people at the right time in the customer cycles encourages the desired action, while personalisation can help to build trust and increase brand awareness. Make sure you keep your database up-to-date too by removing addresses that result in bounces and process opt-outs.

3. Get the subject line and content right

Getting your first message right is a crucial part of determining whether your email is opened, so choose a powerful subject line to arouse curiosity and induce the reader to click through. Create engaging content, whether that be through articles, reviews, special offers or photo galleries depending on your aim. Either include all the content within the email or look at using ‘teaser’ paragraphs which lead to your website.

4. Keep the design simple and visual

The key to the layout of your email campaign is to keep it simple. Make it easy for the reader to absorb content, space out text and separate articles with sub-headings, split up with images and/or videos so it’s varied. A word of warning: remember that every image added increases the time it will take for your message to download for the reader – compress the images to the smallest file size possible.

5. Integrate social media into email marketing

Perhaps the biggest challenge for email marketers is to engage with consumers. This is where social media steps in: it’s the perfect companion for email and presents an ideal outlet for online interaction, just think about the additional reach and additional users who don’t feature on your email lists. By integrating you email marketing with social media, whether through publishing content to social networks, adding social sharing icons and producing an email sign-up form on your channels.

6. Optimise open and click on emails on mobile

A study by Pure360 revealed that out of the 72% who opened emails on a desktop, 27% resulted in clicks, compared to the 28% of emails opened on mobile devices with 10% click rate. Ensure you encourage and incentivise your readers, whatever the industry, to want to click through to read more of the content produced.

7. Follow email etiquette

Help the reader out by offering options. For instance, even though it’s the last thing you want, allow the opportunity for them to unsubscribe, make sure hyperlinks are clear and in blue and add social share buttons. Always proof-read the content, avoid using words known to trigger spam filters and make every email count, don’t go overboard!

8. Measure and analyse!

Use analytics to measure how successful your email campaign has been. Establish important information such as how many people have opened the message, clicked onto the website, unsubscribed, and so on. This, plus sharing and conversion rates plus revenue per email, will determine what has worked and what hasn’t, allowing you to assess what should appear in your next email.

[include_form title=”Need help with your email activity?” subtitle=”We’re always happy to talk, get in touch so we can have a chat!”]

As we all know, social media platforms open up huge opportunities when it comes to reaching and interacting with audiences. But are you getting on the radar of the right people? Are they listening? Do they pay attention to what your brand has to say?

You might have a whole archive of wonderful, interesting content but, building up a loyal following, deciding which digital channels to distribute and how to optimise the content are just some of the key challenges many marketers and businesses may face.

That’s why we have pulled together our top tips on how to grow and nurture your relationship with your audience across social media, which can be easily incorporated into your marketing activities. Don’t be scared – get connecting and optimising!

1) Create content especially for social

Once a new piece of content has been created, consider how you intend it to be shared. Users on social media don’t want to read exhaustive words, nor have the time to spend trawling through a never-ending list of posts; it is crucial to tell a story quickly and creatively.

Don’t simply paste the link into a post; it needs a little time and effort when it comes to constructing it, plus an incentive for the reader to want to click through. Images, compelling language with a call to action and a shortened link (try using bit.ly) are all elements to take into account to help maximise reach and engagement.

It isn’t just about posting content (a blog post or website link), but also instances where this can be shared in ways native to social; we’re talking GIFs in Google+, videos within Facebook adverts, or curating Twitter lists. Get on people’s’ radar the interesting way!

2) Get social involved in your distribution strategy

It’s a good idea to evaluate your strategy to see how social plays a role in your activity, and its effectiveness when it comes to attracting new viewers. Ideally, the various channels should be a key part of your business’ distribution strategy to establish the grounds for potential engagement with customers and followers in the future.

Decide on what metrics you want to measure in terms of social engagement, to track over 3 months (to start to see any emerging patterns) and set targets over a longer period of time. Keep an eye on what your competitors are doing to help set those benchmarks and objectives, and also so you can make sure you’re ahead of the game!

As part of your website analytics, be sure to monitor the referral analytics from social media to see which channels are driving the most traffic and also which posts/pages are performing the best. These results could highlight interesting activity to help determine more efficient and effective sharing strategies for the future.

Something else to consider is identifying influencers in your industry with a significant social following. If you create a strong piece of content, perhaps an informative infographic or how-to guide, this could be something you want these people to see themselves – and share it through their networks to help generate awareness and traffic.

3) It’s not just about ‘going viral’

When creating content, don’t focus on one piece ‘going viral’ as your aim. Instead, approach everything with ‘shareability’ in mind; making sure that each post, page or visual piece of content has the potential to be shared through social media. Think about what you are producing from a customer/reader’s point of view and ask, ‘would I want to share this through my networks?’.

This is where testing social media copy, headlines, images and adding share buttons is essential to encourage your content being shared. Understanding your audience and knowing which channels they are on and how they use them is also a crucial point which will determine this.

4) What’s new on the social media horizon?

Because the social media landscape is ever changing, it is important to keep an eye out for new trends, particularly in online distribution. With new platforms popping up all the time, alongside those which are being utilised by brands like SnapChat and WhatsApp as a means of sharing content, consider these in your own social strategy.

The rolling out of features on established channels like the ‘While you Were Away’ feature on Twitter, or Facebook’s Trending feature, opens up new opportunities for brands to get their content in front of a wider audience. Then there’s the recent arrival or line-streaming apps like Periscope and Meerkat, both of which have been described as the ‘future of social television’; we are becoming spoilt for choice with platform options!

What all this boils down to is knowing what your audience are interested in, which social media channels they use frequently and how they consume content. By using these insights to help inform content and social sharing activity, you can really enhance the experience of your readers, thus helping to build long-term relationships with them.

[include_form title=”Need help with your social activity?” subtitle=”We’re always happy to talk, get in touch so we can have a chat!”]

A day in the life of Jack. You could say Jack is representative of a demographic aged between 21-35, highly engaged in technology and social media channels during their day to day life. They want convenience, accessibility and expect things to be available on demand.

For businesses, this opens up a whole range of opportunities to reach your audience and interact with them through various touchpoints. Using Jack as an example, we have demonstrated a typical journey of a mutli-channel acquisition journey, with statistics and facts to consider along the way.

Although Jack’s day is just an example of a particular demographic, we hope this infographic shows how powerful digital marketing can potentially be when operated through the relevant channels to grab your audiences’ attention.

Multi-Channel Attribution Journey

[include_form title=”Need help with your customer acquisition strategy?” subtitle=”Get in touch to discover how we can help to grow your business.”]